


seagulls and suns

by ymthut



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: M/M, Soulmates, falling in love I guess, fluff n soft bitches only club, friends - Freeform, i miss marks seagull eyebrows :(, tae/jae but up to u if its platonic or not
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-21
Updated: 2018-05-21
Packaged: 2019-05-09 15:59:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14719166
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ymthut/pseuds/ymthut
Summary: “Real bold of you to assume I can even read.” Donghyuck said, staring down at the neatly written English on his wrist.





	seagulls and suns

**Author's Note:**

> is it me?? with another unbeta'd after work cool down?? absolutely

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“Real bold of you to assume I can even read.” Donghyuck said, staring down at the neatly written english on his wrist. He wasn’t speaking to anyone in particular, no one was even in the room with him, but it had been the first thing out of his mouth when he saw the word. He just meant to wash a dish, not realize that he was going to actually meet someone important any time soon.

Soulmates were a hit or miss kind of thing, they weren’t uncommon but also weren’t common and most people didn’t wait on them half the time. Life really wasn’t a fairytale and someone’s soulmate could be continents away from them, never to be met. When that mark became branded in someone’s skin, it was a guarantee they would cross paths, but good luck figuring it out. Fate didn’t care enough to make it easy most of the time.

Especially in Donghyuck’s case, who stood there with his mouth twisting up at the perfect script nestled up to the butt of his palm. If he bent his hand, the tattoo deformed and ruched up. It didn’t make the english anymore understandable to him, he could barely read the standard print. But he knew someone that could.

Pulling his hoodie sleeves down to his knuckles, the boy toed on ratty shoes and left the quiet apartment. It was storming out, rolling clouds with rain falling in scattered sheets, but all Donghyuck was going to do was cross the road to the other complex. He stared a little at a puddle forming in a shallow pothole under the safety of an awning.

There was a moment of weird imagination where he never figured out what it meant- that he lived without fate dictating who he’d spend the rest of his life with. It didn’t have to be romantic, it could just be platonic, but it was still a weird concrete sorta bond. If they were soulmates destined to meet than they’d do just that without knowing what’s embedded on each other’s skin, so did it really matter?

Then Donghyuck thought that it was kind of stupid to think he was smarter than fate and dashed across the asphalt. He pressed rapidly at the apartment number of one of the only english speakers he knew, belatedly realizing he might not be home. The boy was probably more frazzled than he’d like to admit, but went on continuing like he wasn’t as he pulled out his phone.

He didn’t even get to Jaehyun’s name in his contacts before he heard his voice through the intercom. “Hey?” He questioned, staticy and kind of confused but Donghyuck was all but hitting his knuckle to the button. “Let me in, I’m going to get pneumonia.” Donghyuck half-complained, slamming the buzzer a few more times to be annoying until the low hum of the door let him open it.

Ignoring the glare from someone in the lobby as he shook water off the soaked tips of his bangs, he rapidly took the stairs two at a time. The sounds echoed harsh in the hollow stairway, linoleum and rubber making it sound weird and tappy. Donghyuck always hated this building more than his own, there was too many sounds that seemed out of place. It was uncanny and surreal.

The irony of the thought didn’t hit him until he was knocking on Jaehyun’s door, feeling vaguely out of this plane as he absentmindedly rubbed at his wrist. Time felt slow and distant, like he was watching it from outside the room. But it was moving on and the heavy wood was swinging open to reveal a tall guy with a smooth outline of a cat peeking out from under the collar of his shirt and puffy eyes. 

He didn’t even get a chance to ask Donghyuck what he wanted, the boy already ducking under his arm and wandering into the space. Taeyong looked at him from behind a laptop, smile gentle and kind like it always was to him Donghyuck knew he had ‘Yoonoh’ in sloppy, almost illegible hangul on the very edge of his shoulder blade, something he's only seen once. Donghyuck had watched him and Jaehyun fall into each other a couple years back and that was that, together forever and all that romantic stuff except he was never really sure if it was. He never bothered to ask.

“Hello Hyuck.” He said, moving his legs off the couch to let Donghyuck settle on the edge of it and watch him fiddle with the cuff of his sleeve. He looked at him with those unnerving but also weirdly comforting eyes and didn’t say anything, just closed his laptop. Donghyuck could hear Jaehyun come closer, sitting on the arm of the cramped space and probably staring at where his hood obstructed his profile. 

There was a few beats of silence, not exactly tense but worried energy beginning to thrum off the two older men. Donghyuck didn’t blame them, but he’d somehow lost his confident ‘however it goes, goes’ resolve as soon as he got to the corridor. He scratched at his skin. Time still felt like being in jello despite the rain harsh against the glass telling him it wasn’t.

In a jerky motion, Donghyuck pushed up a baggy sleeve and half-shoved his wrist into Jaehyun’s face to the point that the man went a bit cross eyed trying to look at it. “Oh.” Jaehyun said intelligently at first, wrapping a big hand around his arm and pushing it back some before realizing there was something actually on it. “Oh!” He was a little more animated on this time around, lightly twisting the tan appendage to show Taeyong whose eyes took on a certain gleam.

“Yes, ‘oh’, thank you so much. What does it say?” Donghyuck insisted, shaking his arm a little in the grip. Jaehyun made another small noise, kind of embarrassed sounding before he turned the boy’s wrist to look at it fully. “ _Seagull_.” He said pithily in crisp english, blinking at Donghyuck’s blank expression. Donghyuck raised his eyebrows. Jaehyun seemed to catch on. “Um, seagull, the birds at the beach.” He elaborated, making a gesture with his hand that moved Donghyuck’s arm kind of weirdly.

Donghyuck pulled his arm back to his side, rubbing his palm against his wrist as he stared a bit blankly at the coffee table. “ _Seagull_." The word felt weird on this tongue. “And I thought you were a furry.” He said mostly to himself, but smiled a little cheekily at Taeyong’s harsh bark of laughter. It turned to protest when Jaehyun half heartedly shoved his shoulder and he collided into Taeyong’s side.

He spent the night there, curled into Taeyong’s side with Jaehyun’s feet in his lap and Donghyuck’s own fingers hooked loosely around the stained skin. The blue light of the television made his eyes heavy, Taeyong’s warm hand running in the hair at the nape of his neck soothing him to sleep. Donghyuck distantly wondered what his soulmate would be like, if his friends would like him. His index finger twitched against the fabric of Jaehyun’s joggers. 

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He didn’t think much about how he’d figure out who it was, if Jaehyun figured out a cat meant a beautiful pink haired boy in the middle of a supermarket with his shirt tucked in all weird, he could figure out a bird. ‘He was wearing a collar, it was a gut instinct.’ Jaehyun would always argue, to Taeyong’s resigned sigh. ‘It was a choker.’ He’d correct for the upmteenth time. 

 

 

Time went on, and while Donghyuck didn’t forget about the brand embedded on his wrist, it did move to the back of his mind unless he was meeting someone new. He had distantly thought it was a boy he met in a craft store, his laugh high and obnoxious and kind of like a bird. Chenle had been just a mischievous as him, but Dongyuck could tell it wasn’t him after two seconds. Something about instincts, and maybe self preservation.

He still liked him a lot though. They played video games in Donghyuck’s empty apartment until three am too often. With him came another boy with a perfect smile and a boy with a teasing edge to his smirks. Jeno and Jaemin were nice, if a whole lot of something. The invaded Donghyuck’s space almost immediately, pounding on his door every other day demanding attention and calling him when he wasn’t there to complain.

Donghyuck decided he liked them a lot when he called Jeno’s hair an oil slick that someone needed to take a match to and Jeno pushed him to the carpet and tried to smother him with a pillow while laughing a little too loud. He distantly wondered if the neighbor’s would complain about the noise when Chenle’s laugh reverberated throughout the dead space, filling it with a lot more life than it had in a long time.

Jaemin was the first one to ever comment on wrist outside of Jaehyun and Taeyong, well the first one to matter at least. It took a month or two, but he was snatching his arm during a long night. “ _See-ghoul_ ?” He tried sheepishly, a finger running along the endless line of script. “ _Seagull_.” Donghyuck corrected after cursing when Jaemin made his character die on-screen. “Like the birds by the water that everyone gives fries.” He elaborated, handing the controller to Jeno.

He had repeated the english to himself in the dark of living room a few days after it appeared when he realized his parents weren’t going to stop home for the fourth night in a row. He didn’t consider it being lonely, he really wasn’t, but a weird kind of comfort bloomed in the pit of his stomach when he thought that someone might love him more than they’ve loved anyone else in their entire lives.

Donghyuck was more than happy with his friends, the people that took time out just for him and gave him vicious arm burns with wicked grins. The people that filled his life with vivid colors and rambunctious noise. A surreal feeling snuck up on Donghyuck where he was kind of unable to imagine someone who could mean more to him than all of those, but then that relaxed thought that things would just happen came back to him. A soulmate was just another friend, he guessed.

His thoughts blinked back by Jaemin only blinking at him, mouthing the words to himself a few times before his eyes lit up. He dropped Donghyuck’s wrist abruptly, turning to shake Jeno with a few rushed and hushed words despite Jeno’s wailing protest as he struggled to focus on the television. Donghyuck was a bit dumbfounded when his arm was yanked in front of the boy’s line of sight, Jaemin shouting “Seagull eyebrows!” almost directly in his ear.

Jeno and Chenle were also both a little slow to catch up, Chenle not understanding it at all and Jeno finally letting out a half intelligible shout. Donghyuck shared a bewildered look with Chenle as Jaemin and Jeno both got up and started stomping around his apartment. Chenle finally started to say something when Jaemin flicked off the game console, but was soon quieted by Jeno herding them out the door. The boy barely let them put their shoes on before being rushed into the streets.

It was dark with light pollution and city lights making the air orange and yellow, the stars lost in the mud. Donghyuck was complaining loudly as he trudged along the sidewalk, but Jaemin waved at him as he talked a little too animatedly on the phone to be comforting. Chenle hooked his arm with Donghyuck’s with a low sigh. “They’re on something.” He muttered to the boy, making him laugh loud and pitchy and ignoring how Jeno looked a bit insulted.

He was turning over what ‘seagull eyebrows’ could of meant. Donghyuck was smart enough to put the two and two together, that they were going to shove him at someone before the night was over. He couldn’t help but think fate would put more stock into a clue than a pair of eyebrows.

 

 

Fate thought it was funny.

 

 

A boy a little older than him was leaning against the counter when the four of them entered the store, Jaemin bouncing on the balls of his feet. “On the phone- this one!” He was tripping over his words, ripping Donghyuck away from Chenle and pulling him by the forearm forward. “Read it!” The boy insisted, pushing Donghyuck’s wrist into the cashier’s face.

His eyebrows furrowed, notable half-moon shapes that slowly made instinctual gears click into place for Donghyuck. He watched him mouth the word to himself and look kind of confused until Donghyuck offered him a slightly sheepish grin. The boy’s eyes went kind of wide as he stared at his mouth, a knuckle rubbing at his jaw.

“You know english?” Donghyuck said, immediately thinking it was kind of a dumb thing to say to someone that was possibly, probably, his soulmate. The cashier just nodded, eyes finally flitting up to Donghyuck’s. He must of realized he hadn’t said anything yet because he coughed. “Uh, yeah. I’m from Canada.” It was said almost like a question but Donghyuck was too busy thinking that he had one of the nicest voices he’s ever heard.

 

 

Mark Lee was a foreigner who worked for a convenience store that no one ever went to and had a sun under his chin in thick strokes of ink. He wasn’t immediately the most important person in Donghyuck’s life, but boy was he going to be putting up a fight.

 

 

It was kind of awkward at first, the two of them knowing that life had planned for them to have some deep and meaningful connection. It was hard knowing how a story is supposed to end when they’re on the first page and have no idea what to write. The weight of expectations settled on their shoulders and crushed them into the ground. At least Donghyuck’s, because despite all his posturing about ‘whatever’, it all came back to bite him in the ass now.

They spent time together because they guessed they were supposed to, not saying too much at first and finding things where they didn’t really have to talk anyway. They saw a lot of movies. Too many, in all honesty. But they prevented staring uncomfortably at each other for an hour and a half and provided some common, breachable ground. The topic would last them for two hours where they bickered back and forth, before lapsing back into a silence that was slightly more comfortable than before.

It was a work in progress. They were trying a lot harder than Donghyuck thought they were going to, because he really did genuinely like Mark despite how much they kind of clashed. They still went together. Maybe it was the soulmate thing, but it also had to be a them thing for that to work too, right?

They were soulmates because of who they were. They weren’t who they were because they were soulmates. The distinction was weirdly important to him. 

That didn’t mean they magically got along always. Mark looked personally affronted when Donghyuck got snappy with a waiter once. They argued about it for forty minutes, even after Donghyuck left a tip that was bigger than the actual bill like he was going to do in the first place, with or without Mark’s nagging.

Donghyuck kind of wanted to smosh Mark’s cheeks together just to shut him up. When he did, Mark didn’t appreciate the sentiment. But they were working on it.

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Their relationship formed around their differences more than their similarities. Making fun of each other, mostly Donghyuck harassing Mark, and wanting the other to just be quiet, mostly Mark pushing his palm against Donghyuck’s face. It was an exasperated kind of fondness that made Donghyuck’s toes curl when Mark texted him seven sighing and three cold mask emojis in a row.

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“How did you know it was supposed to mean me?” Donghyuck asked one day, staring at the solar symbol under Mark’s chin. He was looking up at the ceiling, eyeing a fluorescent light that looked filthy. Mark’s face snapped back down to look at his, looking mildly confused before Donghyuck tapped his fingers against the boy’s jawline.

Mark let out a low ‘uh’ sound, looking kind of flustered. Donghyuck let the edges of a smile smear across his lips. “That.” The boy said, gesturing with a flapping hand to Donghyuck’s face. He reached a hand up to feel his stretched lips, looking confused before grinning brightly. Mark rolled his eyes and didn’t make eye contact with him for a while, face red. 

The idea that maybe they weren’t actually soulmates, that they just happened to get things that reminded them of each other, eroded at the back of Donghyuck’s mind on the nights he was alone and the days that he spent around people. If the gut instinct when he first saw Mark was wrong. But he’d breathe through his nose and remind himself that what happened, happened. It had become his motto these past few months.

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The first time Mark visited his apartment was when Jisung had been trying to sink into the crevices of his couch with cheeto dust in the folds of his scrunched up neck. Both of them pulled a face at the boy when they walked through the door. “Oh, is this _seagull_ ?” He asked, not moving but watching the pair as Donghyuck closed the door.

Mark looked around, a little wide eyed and glossy floors and lint-free upholstery, but didn’t comment. Donghyuck wasn’t sure how to tell him that Taeyong came over twice a week and practically held him at metaphorical gunpoint to clean the entire place with him, so he didn’t. Instead, he frowned at Jisung. “How did you even get in man?” Donghyuck questioned, still crossing the threshold of the footwell to give him a weird and slightly confusing handshake.

“I have my ways.” Jisung wiggled his fingers of one hand at Donghyuck, a smirk crossing his face. “You also don’t hide your key well.” He elaborated, the other hand holding up the spare between his index and middle fingers. Donghyuck let out a groan while Mark made a weird ‘snirk’ of a noise.

“Get out.” Donghyuck said, pulling his friend by the legs and ignoring how he squawked in indignation, fingers digging into the cloth of the couch. Jisung mock-sneered back as he latched into the back of the sofa. “Mark, defend me!” He demanded, kicking at Donghyuck’s hands with oddly sticky feet when he got a leg free. 

Donghyuck made some sort of noise of disbelief at the comment, only for it to be heightened when Mark actually spoke up. “I don’t care if he stays.” He offered, a bit sheepish looking when Donghyuck turned on him with a stare of betrayal. Donghyuck opened his mouth to protest, but Jisung ripped his other foot out of his grasp and cackled over whatever was going to come out. 

They ended up with Jisung wedged between them on a crowded sofa, the youngest screaming and throwing chips at Donghyuck’s television when the B-list horror movie decided to jumpscare them. He could feel Taeyong taking the vacuum to his soul with each crumb. Donghyuck debated pushing Jisung off the couch for vindication in the future, but decided he was bigger than that. He did crush a tortilla chip into the collar of his shirt, though.

Despite himself, Donghyuck actually watched the dragging film with some vague amount of interest. There was a faint register that being slightly interested in anything he saw was a mistake with the people he hung around with. They were kind of demons. Just like him.

He jolted when Mark reached over Jisung to press a cold hand to the back of his neck during a particularly tense moment, doing that stupid hacking giggle where he clapped his hands when Donghyuck nearly leapt off the couch. The boy in between them let out a wail of a laugh too, and Donghyuck recounted his resolve to not push him to the floor and did just that.

Not that he said much when Mark wormed his arm along the back of his couch and pressed his fingers into Donghyuck’s nape as an apology, leaving them there for a while.

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Jaemin called him weak one Saturday evening when he paid more attention to Mark’s text than their facetime. He instinctively reached for something to throw at him before realizing that the boy was halfway across town. Donghyuck settled for frowning into his front-facing camera while his friend hollered at him.

“Shouldn’t you be thanking me? I was the one that put two and two together.” He said, examining his nails. “I’m still deciding if Mark’s a gift or a curse, I’ll tell you in a few weeks.” Donghyuck replied, stretching across the sofa in the dimly lit room and ignoring how Jaemin rolled his eyes.

“It’s been like three decades.” He half-muttered, microphone muffled where it got tucked under his arm. Donghyuck just his tongue out, remembering he’s not the only one with a taste for theatrics. “Color me crayola’s recently released shade of embarrassed for not realizing that.” He taunted right back, thumbing through his phone to get back to Mark’s contact.

“That was a good one, Donghyuck.” A far off voice of an off-screen called, followed by Jaemin hissing a “No, it wasn’t Renjun.” in fierce denial. Donghyuck grinned because yeah, it was.

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Taeyong showed up at his door with bibimbap and a curious stare at Mark sitting in his living room. Donghyuck wanted to roll his eyes as both of them craned their necks with wide eyes to look at each other, stepping to the side to let his friend enter. The man was a little hesitant, taking small steps before Donghyuck all but shoved him forward until he clutched the bowl and glared at the boy with insultment. 

Taeyong knew about Mark, how his stupid eyebrows were supposed to be the telltale sign and how he was from Canada and that Donghyuck was beginning to, really did, like him a lot, but had never met him. It just never crossed either of their minds to introduce Mark to his mom-friend, even though it was probably the closest Mark would get to his actual mother for a long time. He quelled the distant if-ever in the back of his head and called it over dramatic because it was.

He watched Taeyong eye the rays that reached their solar arms across the underside of Mark’s jaw and make a quiet ‘ah’ sound, as if he completely understood. Donghyuck started to wonder what he looked like to other people when he smiled. He pressed his lips into a thin line and tried to think of anyone ever mentioning it to him.

Donghyuck ate lukewarm bibimbap on the couch, elbowing Mark hard in the ribs when he reached for his spoon while Taeyong vibrated in laughter. “I would of made more if I knew you were here.” He offered, resting his arms and chin on the low coffee table.

“Dude, I’m always here. Feed me.” Mark said, shaking his hand from where Donghyuck had whacked it for getting too close to the bowl. Taeyong’s maternal smile turned to a smirk and Donghyuck remembered he couldn’t trust anyone close to him. “Oh, are you now?” He asked, cocking his head toward Donghyuck who glared at him from over his bowl. “Yea-” The boy was cut off as Donghyuck shoved a spoonful into his mouth. He maintained a huffy eye contact with Taeyong the entire time.

“Did you know Taeyong found his soulmate because he’s a furry?” Donghyuck said smoothly, watching both of his guests splutter. Taeyong’s was in protest, Mark in hysteria or hysterics around food. “Donghyuck!” Taeyong hissed. A lot like a cat. “Forgive me, Taeyong. It was petplay. They’re actually are very different, Mark. I was confused too.” He elaborated, looking at Mark with a grin.

Mark all but choked under Taeyong’s wails of “It was a choker!”. Donghyuck just sat back, smug in getting the upper hand back. He swallowed another spoonful while Taeyong tried desperately to defend himself to Mark.

Mark cleared his throat when Taeyong ceased yelling. “There’s nothing wrong with either of those things, Taeyong...” He said quietly, falsely innocent Donghyuck may add. He kind of knew that Mark was his soulmate then, dumb seagull eyebrows or not. He gave Mark the rest of his food as positive reinforcement. Taeyong looked like he wanted to rip his hair out by the roots. 

“Yeah, don’t be a dick to entire communities Taeyong. It’s a shit move.” Donghyuck piled on, straight up cackling when Taeyong shook him the shoulders.

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“Taeyong told me it was like two for one at the little shit store this afternoon.” Jaehyun’s voice came out tinny over the phone. Donghyuck just laughed lit and bold. “He also told me you’d be in love with Mark in five minutes if you’d let yourself.” Donghyuck choked on his own spit.

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Sprawled out on Donghyuck’s bed, Mark’s socked foot nudged his thigh. “Hey.” He muttered, low and curious. It immediately got Donghyuck’s attention, raising his eyebrows. “Where are your parents?” The question was asked into a quiet room, amplified when Donghyuck just shrugged indifferently and Mark’s seagull eyebrows scrunched up. “When’s the last time you saw them?” He offered again, sitting up when Donghyuck could only do the same gesture. “Maybe a month ago?”

“Dude, are your parents even alive?” Mark questioned, edging closer to where Donghyuck sat at the headboard. “Yeah, they put money in my account and get groceries delivered all the time.” Donghyuck said, indifferent. He wasn’t bitter, far from it.

He loved his parents and he guessed they loved him, but maybe it was kind of weird how they worked as a dynamic. He figured he should know for sure if his parents loved him or if they just saw him as a chore, but it was probably just some deep seated insecurity talking. He never really had a reason to think otherwise.

Mark fiddled with the hem of his shirt for a little while, lapsing back into quiet. Donghyuck was weirdly kicked back into that time where his mark first showed up, where time felt like a removed concept and nothing moved. Except now the sky was dark and his window fan hummed a weird sound that should probably get looked at soon.

“That’s lame of them.” Mark finally said, leaning his head against Donghyuck’s shoulder a bit tentatively. As if Donghyuck might elbow him off instead of sinking into the touch. Mark's hair felt kind of scratchy against his cheek when he let it loll to rest against the crown of the boy's head, but it was nice.

He made a face, really thinking about it for the first time in a while. “Yeah, kind of. But it’s okay.” He agreed and spoke honestly. It was okay because he found family in more places than one and even then, being alone didn’t mean lonely. Mark didn't really have anything else to say. 

Donghyuck remembered that Mark was probably, was definitely, going to be his family in some way. If he wasn’t already. But Donghyuck didn’t know how to start that conversation, didn’t even really know how he felt to begin with anyway. He just let the thoughts sit there instead. They made him vibrate warmly inside.

They didn’t mean to fall asleep, propped up against the headboard where Donghyuck’s back hurt and Mark’s neck got a crick in it, but it happened anyway. Donghyuck listened to Mark snore in his ear before he passed out, distantly considering ideas about what kind of soulmates that they were gonna be.

 

 

Donghyuck kicked his legs from the granite countertop, watching Mark cook something that smelled weird with a lot of cheese in it. Cook was a liberal word, it was really Mark trying to heat french fries in a pan and dumping processed cheese slices and old gravy mix from the back of Donghyuck’s cupboards on them. “It’s a canadian delicacy.” He explained, dumping it in an unattractive heap on a plate.

“Westerners are terrifying.” Donghyuck replied smoothly, making a face when Mark shoved one into his mouth and kicking at his chest when the boy tried to push one into Donghyuck’s. Donghyuck nearly screamed when thick gravy smeared across his lips, Mark’s laugh loud in the dead apartment.

It gave it a different life than Chenle’s cackle, the dolphin sound filling it with rich friendship and ear pulling. The sound of laying in a sprinkler on a hot summer day with someone and just relishing in the way that cold water made every trouble evaporate. Even if it was for a little while. It was thick and light, filled with love that could be cut with a butter knife.

Mark’s still bled friendship, but there was a lining to it as he wiped at Donghyuck’s face with the edge of a hoodie sleeve. It was warm and curled around him like nothing else did, finding security in a single thing more than he’s ever had. Donghyuck thought about how he used to crawl into bed between his parents, but this didn’t feel like one-sided protection. It was a form of mutualism that only came with equality.

Donghyuck thought about the phone call with Jaehyun a month ago and curled his toes before complaining loudly about greasy residue on his delicate complexion.

 

 

Convenience stores felt like another dimension. Donghyuck sat behind the counter next to Mark’s legs as he made affable small talk with someone. He wonder what it was like to see Mark and not think he was meant to be with them their entire life. The boy looked up at his soulmate, his friend, and gave a small smile when Mark glanced down at him. He mouthed a ‘what’, but Donghyuck ignored him until he heard the ancient bells above the door jingle.

Each interaction made Donghyuck anxious in a way that wasn’t particularly warranted but still apparent. He wasn’t sure what it was, making him cock his head as stared at the thick black outlines under Mark’s jaw. He blinked when he realized that Mark was staring back at him with those seagull eyebrows, quickly looking down to say something and pretend that he wasn’t embarrassed.

“Your shoes look like you’re from a pop punk band in 2002.” Donghyuck said, poking at the pink converse before he was kicked lightly in the side. He wanted to scream his protest but figured he deserved it. Mark was smiling anyway, and that’s what counted.

The shift dragged on like that, Donghyuck fiddling with his phone and dragging Mark for random things that came to mind to make him roll his eyes. “You know, I’ve never seen that floor cleaned in my life.” Mark said with his arched brows, looking at where Donghyuck was half laying on it. “Your point?” Was all he got in return.

A tall chinese boy who spoke stilted korean changed shifts with Mark two hours later, blonde hair a mop against his forehead. He called himself Winwin and when Donghyuck asked if that was his legal name, he gave a shrug. “Why not?” He said slowly, clipping on his nametag studiously.

The autumn air was crisp against Donghyuck’s face, it made Mark’s cheeks go red and the faintest traces of their breath were in the air. They walked back to Donghyuck’s apartment in relative quiet, pinkies and ring fingers clasped around each other. It made Donghyuck hum with a weird sort of warmth.

“Do you think we’re gonna be the type to love or to be in love?” He asked Mark suddenly, but the boy didn’t freeze up. “Why do you ask?” Mark questioned back easily, kicking a candy wrapper out of their way absentmindedly. Donghyuck hummed a little, tightening his grip on the other’s knuckles for just a second.

“Taeyong said that if I gave myself permission, I could fall in love with you. Or something like that. It was a while ago.” Donghyuck finally said, watching the ghost of his lungs evaporate in front of him. Mark made a vague sound of acknowledgement, nodding along.

Mark’s hand came to fully rest in Donghyuck’s, bony fingers warm in the chilled air. “Maybe he has a point.” He sighed. It wasn’t a sound of resignation, just more like finally putting an answer to something that’s been haunting someone for a while.

 

 

Donghyuck crawled into Mark’s lap when it was early winter and kissed him for the first of many times while a slurry of rain, snow, and hail clattered against his building. It was on the same sofa that was steadily wearing down, a stain from where Jeno spilt apple cider a month ago never fading away. Donghyuck thought a lot about how his friends changed his life, how they were all important to him. But Mark had become just a little, if not a lot, more. 

Donghyuck figured that’s how fate went, but he also thought that’s just how it was going to be to begin with. His thumbs brushed under Mark’s jaw, half-tracing the mark there and wondering how important he was to him. If Donghyuck meant just as much to him.

He pulled back to look at Mark in the dim light, remembering the week he saw that his half moon brows where tweezed to graphic, arched lines. “You don’t need them to find me anymore, right?” Mark had joked, wrapping a hand around Donghyuck’s branded wrist. Donghyuck had just grinned back. He thought he could pick Mark’s heart beat out of a crowded room if he was given enough time.

But he was looking at Mark now and Mark was looking back with half-lidded eyes that lingered on his own and his lips, flicking up and down rhythmically. “That was cool, right?” Donghyuck said into the quiet, bringing his forehead down to rest against Mark’s after he let out a shaky “Yeah.” with pale hands coming to his hips.

It was a soft kind of exchange, not lazy and lethargic, but not rushed and desperate. As if reveling in the new level of intimacy that they knew was going to stick around for a while. Maybe, probably, hopefully, the rest of their lives.

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The dark living room wasn’t so empty anymore, Donghyuck’s cheek pressed up against Mark’s chest as they laid on the couch. Mark’s soft snores mingled with those of their friends', Jisung’s practically shaking the room and Renjun’s a weird sort of whistle that freaked Donghyuck out a little. He eyed the vague outline of Jeno in the barely there light of his phone, eyes curved as he squinted.

He thought of Jaehyun and Taeyong across the street from them, how Taeyong had dragged them all out for Donghyuck’s birthday a few days ago with a tired Jaehyun trailing along. Taeyong had tried to swing Donghyuck around in a hug, but only got as far as lifting the boy a millimeter off the ground before giving up. He wasn’t sure what he expected when he barely had an inch on Donghyuck, but he’d laughed at his neighbor anyway and kissed his cheek comically enough to earn a giggling shove.

Each individual person made their own place in Donghyuck’s home, hitting back the cobwebs with their bare hands and making upset noises when it was on their skin. They kept swatting anyway, for whatever reason. Whatever worth they saw in Donghyuck’s grin. His fingers curled in the fabric of Mark’s tank top.

Donghyuck never lied to himself when he said he wasn’t lonely, but having company was decidedly a lot better than being alone.

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**Author's Note:**

> i skimmed over this once i need a beta bc real bold assumption that I Can Even Read but me?? actively talk to anyone in the kpop community?? absolutely not
> 
> pay attention to me on twitter i don't post anything but i want friends  
> [@ymthut](https://twitter.com/ymthut)


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